Undocumented individuals will become a larger share of the uninsured

As of March 2010, there were an estimated 11.2 million undocumented immigrants in the United States. Currently, three in ten immigrants are undocumented, while only one in seven of the uninsured is an undocumented immigrant. As there exists no consensus on immigration reform, undocumented individuals will gradually become a larger share of the uninsured population due to exclusion from all programs of the Affordable Care Act.

This study utilized data from the 2000-2008 Current Population Survey, a major source for health insurance coverage information in the US. The authors compiled insurance coverage data, as well as information on age, race, sex, health status, income, education, and employment. Immigration status was not a variable in the survey. Instead, undocumented status was derived by subtracting individuals presumed to be in the country legally from the entire foreign-born population. Foreign-born residents who arrived in the US before 1980, refugees, those granted political asylum, and those earning legal status under the Immigration Reform and Control Act were assumed to be legal.

This study focused on the non-elderly population. The authors performed a descriptive analysis of trends in coverage and logistic regression models to isolate the impact of immigration status (native-born citizens, naturalized citizens, legal permanent residents, and undocumented immigrants) on the probability of having private coverage, public coverage, or being uninsured.

Between 1999 and 2007, the number of uninsured Americans increased by 6.7 million (39.3 to 46 million). The number of undocumented immigrants increased by 1.8 million (4.9 to 6.7 million). Uninsured undocumented immigrants accounted for 27 percent of the increase in the uninsured during this period. While there was a 37.6 percent increase in undocumented immigrants, the native born population only increased by 5.9 percent. The growth of uninsured undocumented immigrants was due to overall population growth and not an overwhelming increase in their rates of uninsurance.

The distribution of coverage by immigration status revealed that almost three-quarters of citizens (native-born and naturalized) had private insurance. On the contrary, only slightly more than half of legal residents and slightly more than one-third of undocumented immigrants had private insurance. After adjustment for various social factors, the authors determined that higher rates of uninsurance persist for the undocumented population, all else being equal.

As an example, the researchers compared insurance coverage among all people living below 133 percent of the federal poverty level ($27,465 for a family of 4 in 2007). There existed a similar rate of private coverage across all immigration types yet dramatic variations in the rate of uninsurance; nearly half (49.7 percent) of poor undocumented immigrants were uninsured while only 26.6 of poor native born citizens were uninsured. The major factor affecting uninsurance rates for people of different immigration statuses turned out to be public insurance coverage. Even at higher income levels (above 400 percent FPL or $82,600), undocumented immigrants were over three times as likely to be uninsured compared to native-born citizens (19.5 vs. 6.6 percent).

Commentary

The CBO estimates that that even after full implementation of the Affordable Care Act, 23 million will remain uninsured. Undocumented immigrants will constitute a much higher percentage of this group by virtue of increasing coverage for citizens and legal residents. As do many other provisions in US law, the ACA provides rights to native-born individuals that are not afforded to certain foreign-born individuals. Such unequal treatment ignores an entire group of individuals who greatly impact the US health care system. As in other forms of non-immigration law, the exclusion of undocumented immigrants from the ACA is a roundabout way of crafting anti-immigration policy.

US health law is riddled with anti-immigration policy. In the 1990s, California passed (and eventually overturned) Proposition 187, which prohibited undocumented immigrants from public benefits, including health coverage. In 1993, the NIH Revitalization Act imposed an HIV travel and immigration ban requiring all immigrants to be tested for HIV. The ban was lifted in January 2010. The 2005 Deficit Reduction Act requires proof of citizenship for all Medicaid applicants.

While anti-immigration policy appears in health care law, American citizens are often the unspoken casualties of such attempts to exclude immigrants. For example, proof of citizenship has proven to be more of a burden on Medicaid eligible Americans, contributing to the “eligible but uninsured” category of the uninsured.

The US has pit immigration reform against health care reform. If this country is truly committed to eliminating the problem of uninsurance as well as illegal immigration, it should seriously consider either a pathway to legal status or devise a way to deport all 11.2 million (and counting) undocumented people. Either way, uninsured undocumented immigrants cannot simply be ignored.

Renée Volny is a physician who blogs at Policy Prescriptions.

Submit a guest post and be heard on social media’s leading physician voice.

Undocumented individuals will become a larger share of the uninsured 7 comments

I can’t believe that this article is trying to pass itself off as a plausible valid study. This one sentence invalidates the ENTIRE premise. “The authors compiled insurance coverage data, as well as information on age, race, sex, health status, income, education, and employment. Immigration status was not a variable in the survey. Instead, undocumented status was derived by subtracting individuals **presumed** to be in the country legally from the entire foreign-born population.”

The authors made presumptions on ‘facts’ that were integral for this study? PUL-LEASE! This is worse than plagerism. This is fiction, not a valid study. Dr. Pho, please highlight valid studies, not fiction!

I appreciate your comments. You are right on about the difficulty of the premise behind this article. Unfortunately, there are no large scale data available to determine who is **actually** undocumented when in comes to the Current Population Survey.

Despite the questionable validity of the specific numbers cited by the study, common sense (as well as kullervo) dictates that once more Americans have health insurance via Medicaid as a result of the Affordable Care Act, the uninsured population will become increasingly composed of undocumented immmigrants. Despite the fact knowing **exactly** what percent are undocumented vs. foreign-born but legal, the issue will still remain.

So what should we do about it? Assuming that we value insuring EVERYONE in the US.
a) nothing, ignore the undocumented and let them stay (largely) uninsured
b) deport them, and thereby reduce the number that can contribute to the uninsured population
c) add health coverage, but keep them illegal
d) provide a path to legal status & therefore a path towards public insurance (Medicaid)

I’d love to hear your thoughts. And we hope our next post at Policy Prescriptions (http://www.policyrx.org) is more to your liking.

You’re making a huge assumption that WE value insuring EVERYONE. I believe healthcare should be affordable, but not free. I believe that high-end medical evaluation and treatment should be available to all and not cost prohibitive. I DO NOT believe that healthcare is a constitutionally given right of the American people.

However, given I’m not a grandiose law-maker or a mover-and-a-shaker, I’ll work with the choices that you’ve offered. I’d probably lean more towards ‘B’. Call me Scrooge.

For the record, your and your staff write your articles as you see fit and not cater to any one individual or party’s liking. It’s what helps open up discussions that are important. Thank you.

Anonymous

And they needed a study to show that when you insure your citizenry, more of the uninsured will be non-citizens? Next time don’t hire a bunch of researchers— call me! I’ll tell you the same thing for five bucks.

Of course, to lower the percentage of uninsured illegal immigrants, we can always leave more of our citizens uninsured. Don’t mean to be cranky, but I’m waiting for a bill for a CT scan with contrast.

We have an “immigration problem” because we turned off the lamp and slammed shut the golden door and put Ellis Island out of business.
It is revolting to see those mighty people whose ancestors came here penniless and mostly illiterate, take the stage on various debates saying that we should only accept immigrants with “skills” and education. What happened to “Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breath free. The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me.”?
I don’t see any reference to richness and skills. The people we are looking to deport now are the people we used to welcome a few decades ago, and their educated wealthy descendants debating “immigration” are the living proof that an open door policy works very well in the long term.

Anonymous

“We have an “immigration problem” because we turned off the lamp and slammed shut the golden door and put Ellis Island out of business.”

~~~~

Those people who entered through Ellis Island did so legally. And it wasn’t so open door to many of them. There was a very low quota for those who came from “undesirable” countries, such as my parents who were denied entry because they were Hungarian. But they were accepted to Canada where they stayed and became Canadian citizens, and after 10 years were then accepted in the U.S. My mother said when they crossed the boarder from Vancouver, they had to sign a paper that they wouldn’t become a financial burden on America, when the only assistance available at that time was a soup kitchen.

Today the U.S. accepts over 1 million legal immigrants yearly; most of these come from Mexico, India, China and the Phillippines. And that doesn’t include refugees, asylum seekers, and family reunification members. And showered with all the financial, educational, and medical benefits too many to list. What other country is as generous?